The vicar says the sign is being misunderstood. The idea is to get people talking about the Immaculate Conception and the Christmas story, to wit: The Virgin Mary gave birth to God’s son.

Sorry, padre, but it ain’t working out that way.

The sign was defaced hours after it appearing outside of St. Matthew-in-the-City Anglican church, letters to the editor have called it “blasphemy” and the local Catholic diocese is among the crowd trashing it.

The convention is the big annual event of an established, major conservative fund-raising operation.

The John Birch Society is an organization of hard-right ideologues who have, in the past, warned of a One World Government and have advocated dismantling the Federal Reserve System.

With moderate Republicans shying away from the Tea Party movement, the Tea Party flexing its muscles, and now this, it appears a full-blown schism is in the making for American conservatism.

In happier news….

In your face…bookAthletes like to talk trash in games, but they love their families and they’re very grateful to God when they win. You never hear about God or their families when they lose, which is odd.

Anywho, while you can’t control smack talk or belief systems, Our Lady of the Lake University is using social media and EnterWeb magic to help its athletes stay in touch with their families.

Writing in the OLLU City Brights blog, Patty Constantin tells the story of how the school streams its athletic events — ESPN hasn’t come knocking yet — so that parents can keep up with their kids as they play. The school also uses Live Stream Box, an application within Facebook, to provide text updates from attendees at the game.

This is good for most parents, who are sane, normal, nurturing and will be able to keep up with their kids.

For the crazy ones, i.e. “me,” this is some bullcrap! Sure, I/they can watch the game, but they don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of being asked to leave the gym for constantly taunting the referees or second-guessing the coach’s decisions. Where’s the fun in that?

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